Lightning Behind Their Eyes and Thunder in Their Hearts
by Swa-Sa Masou
Summary: Different ending for Spellmanian Slip. I don't dislike Aaron like I disliked Josh, but Harvey and Sabrina were meant to be and leaving someone at the altar is a crappy thing to do.


"Aaron loves me and I love Harvey."

"Harvey?" Aaron stared at his fiancée in complete incredulity. She had not just said her ex-boyfriend's name. She couldn't have. How many times had she promised him they were just friends, that there was nothing between them, that she loved him, Aaron, and not Harvey.

"Harvey?" Aaron's parents echoed their son. Well, this certainly put a damper on an already lackluster night. Their son's latest fiancée seemed to be even less well-suited for Aaron than they had thought thus far.

"Harvey?" Two more voices could be heard joining the chorus of shock. Roxie and Morgan were far less upset than Aaron and his parents, but were still caught off guard. If she loved Harvey, why had she agreed to marry Aaron?

"Me?" Harvey's voice was the only one saying anything different, but as it had come out in a whisper, it wasn't heard by anyone else in the room. He had been trying to tell her that his feelings hadn't changed, and then finally had admitted as much to her, only to have her still choose Aaron. Not that he could blame her. He had broken her heart back at the end of high school and had dated her roommate on top of that. He knew it wasn't fair to expect her to return these feelings, but what if she did?

"No, I didn't mean that. Aaron. I meant Aaron. Aaron, you know I love you. I don't know why I said that. I'm just nervous and this night has been so stressful and my eyes just landed on him across the room so I said his name instead of yours. I'm so sorry. I love you, Aaron. I promise. I want to marry you."

Aaron continued to hold Sabrina's hand, but was reluctant to raise his gaze to meet hers. It was not lost on him that what should be a very private conversation was being witnessed by his parents, Sabrina's roommates, and Harvey, the man whose name his own fiancée had said when proclaiming love just a moment ago. Still, despite the audience, he couldn't keep a chocked, "do you?" from crossing his lips.

"Aaron," Sabrina brought a hand up to his cheek, focusing their eyes to meet each other's, "I do. Please believe me."

He broke their locked stares and looked to his parents, "Maybe you two should head out to the car, I'll be there soon." His mother began an objection, but, thankfully, his father took her by the arm and led her toward the door.

Swiveling to look at Morgan, Roxie, and Harvey, he and Sabrina both silently communicated to the three of them to leave as well. Morgan remained oblivious, but was removed from the living room and up the stairs by Roxie. Harvey headed toward the front door. They were finally alone.

"Aaron, I'm so sorry. You know that I want to marry you. It's been fast, and it's been tumultuous, but it's also been amazing being with you. You have to believe me." Sabrina sat down in the nearest chair, with all of the strength seeming to exit her body as soon as she made contact. "this has been such a very long night. Nothing went right, so I don't know why I should have expected my big profession of love for you to have gone any better." She dropped her head to her hands and sighed deeply.

Aaron seated himself next to her and put an arm around her shoulders, pulling her into him. "I know you love me, and I know I love you. But if he's still in the back of your mind like this, then I don't know how we can go forward with a wedding." He rubbed her shoulder with his hand and moved the other to cradle her head against his chest.

"Aaron, please- " Sabrina began to speak, to try to offer up another explanation, but Aaron cut her off.

"Sabrina, you've been under a lot of stress and I know this hasn't been an easy night. Why don't you sleep on it and I will too and we'll talk tomorrow? We'll see if we both have a fresh perspective." He kissed the top of her head and gently moved away from her to stand up. "I love you, get some rest." And Aaron walked out of the door of the Spellman house.

He was so distracted as he walked toward his car that he didn't notice Harvey standing in the bushes, next to a black cat.

* * *

Harvey slipped back inside and shut the door quietly.

He moved to stand in front of Sabrina, still seated where Aaron had left her in the living room and knelt down in front of her, "Hey," Harvey honestly had no idea where to go from there. The two of them had always shared something special where communication was pretty effortless, but even that has a line. And saying that you love someone else while holding your fiance's hand crosses that line. He just reached out and gave her knee a gentle squeeze and hoped that she would make the next move.

At his touch, Sabrina looked up and gave him a small smile. "Hey, I tell you that you've got to move past what we had and then I go and do something like this. Great job, way to go, Sabrina! What are you doing here, anyway? I thought you left when Roxie and Morgan went upstairs?"

Harvey stood up and sat down next to her, keeping a respectful distance between them on the sofa, "I did, but Salem stopped me as I was leaving and told me you might need someone after Aaron left. If he was wrong, I can leave."

Sabrina chuckled, "No, Salem was right. Wow, that's not something I say often." she shook her head, "I may have just destroyed my chance at getting married and Aaron's heart with one single word. I could use a hug."

He didn't need any more and pulled her to him. They sat mostly in silence for a few moments as Sabrina held back what crying she could and Harvey rubbed slow, what he hoped was soothing, circles on her back. Sabrina sat up and swiped beneath both of her eyes.

"I'm sorry, this really isn't fair to you at all. You bare your soul to me and then I end up sobbing on your shoulder for screwing up a relationship by saying that I love you. Jeesh, how much more complicated can I make this for you?"

Harvey's heart, which had swollen with happiness when she said his name earlier, sank to the pit of his stomach at hearing that. He tucked a strand of hair being her ear and took a deep breath. "It's really not complicated for you me, Sabrina. You love him and you marry him, and I get out of your way. Or you love me and we go from there. Puck's in your zone, you just have to let me know." In a nearly exact image of what Aaron did before he left, Harvey leaned forward and softly pecked the top of her head as he stood up." I'm your friend, I just happen to have more than friendly feelings for you. But that doesn't have to mean anything if what you said earlier really doesn't mean anything. What did Aaron say before he left?"

Sabrina flopped back against the couch, "He told me to sleep on it and that he would too and we can talk about it in the morning."

Harvey backed up to lean against the wall. He wanted to kiss her. He wanted to hold her and never let go. He wanted her to not be in pain or be confused, but that wasn't his job, was it? It hadn't been for years.

"Poor guy." Harvey whispered more to himself than to Sabrina, but she heard and scoffed.

"Yeah, like you really feel bad for him. You want me to choose you." Sabrina looked accusingly across the room, daring him to contradict her.

"Of course I do, but until 20 minutes ago, I didn't even know that was an option." Harvey all but spit out the words. Hearing Sabrina say the words 'choose you' sparked so many memories for him, that his next speech came out more harshly than he meant as well. "But I've been in his position. I've been the one you were in a committed relationship with, or what I thought was a committed relationship, only to find out that there was some other guy you also had feelings for. And I'm not just talking about Josh. Think all the way through high school. How many times did you do this to me? We had so many love triangles that the geometry club could have used us for diagrams. And not all of those were equilateral!" Sabrina smiled at the reference to his favorite triangle and one of their first relationship hurdles. "Sometimes I was closer to you and sometimes it was whoever the other guy was. I know what it feels like, and it sucks. At least I never had an engagement ring on your finger." He slumped back and took a deep breath. He really had no idea he had been holding all of that inside.

Sabrina sat up and stared at the floor. Finally, she said, "you're right. It was never fair to you and this isn't fair to Aaron. He really loves me and here I am saying your name." She stood up and crossed to stand in front of her ex-boyfriend. "But you know what? I always came to my senses and came back to you. We broke up because of you. You found out I was a witch and you bailed."

Harvey straightened and looked down at Sabrina. "all this time, even now, after all I've helped you with over the last couple of years with your magic, have you really thought it was you being a witch that I was upset about? If I had a problem with your magic, why would I be here now, huh?"

Sabrina was taken aback. The entire conversation, and she remembered every word, after his spell quota was hit was about her being a witch and it ended in them not being together anymore. How could it be about anything else? "If it was never about my magic, then what was it about?"

He sighed again, wishing he had just kept quiet, "it was about what you did with your magic. You always used it to bail you out of normal, mortal problems, or else it got you into more trouble than you ever could have gotten into alone. It also made you think that there would always be an easy way out. You used it to try to choose between me and Josh twice. It was a lot to take in, I knew you weren't sure about being with me, and we were on our way to different schools. It was never about my feelings for you or about you being a witch."

Sabrina didn't know how to respond to any of what he had just said, so she did the only command that her brain was clearly giving her: she wrapped her arms around his neck and kissed him.

It was amazing.

It was fireworks.

It was lighting behind their eyes and thunder in their hearts.

It was beyond words.

It was MAGIC.

Her kisses with Aaron didn't feel like this. Her kisses with Josh hadn't felt like this.

This was pure Harvey. Their chemistry was unmatched. They just fit together.

He was Harvey and she was Sabrina and they just worked, they always had.

The problem was she was engaged to Aaron. With a gasp she pulled back.

"No, I can't. I can't do this. I'm engaged to Aaron. I can't. I can't. I can't." With each declaration, Sabrina stepped backwards until she fell back onto the sofa she had recently vacated.

Harvey took a second to respond, he was still feeling tingling in his lips, "I understand. I'm here, Sabrina, however you need me, I'm here." With that he walked past her toward the door. Just as he was about to reach for the handle, Sabrina finally spoke again,

"No, Harvey, I can't marry him."


End file.
